CHAP. II.] THE SECOND DA V. 59 



have given her no rest since we came ; sure she will hardly escape 

 all these dogs and men. I am to have the skin if we kill her. 



Venator. Why, Sir, what is the skin worth ? 



Huntsman. It is worth ten shillings to make gloves ; the 

 gloves of an Otter are the best fortification for your hands that 

 can be thought on against wet weather. 



PiscATOR. I pray, honest Huntsman, let me ask you a pleasant 

 question : do you hunt a beast or a fish ? 



Huntsman. Sir, it is not in my power to resolve you ; I 

 leave it to be resolved by the college of Carthusians, who have 

 made vows never to eat flesh. But, I have heard, the question 

 bath been debated among many great clerks, and they seem to 

 differ about it ; yet most agree that her tail is fish : and if her 

 body be fish too, then I may say that a fish will walk upon land : 

 for an Otter does so sometimes, five or six or ten miles in a night, 

 to catch for her young ones, or to glut herself with fish. And I 

 can tell you that Pigeons will fly forty miles for a breakfast : but, 

 Sir, I am sure the Otter devours much fish, and kills and spoils 

 much more than he eats. And I can tell you that this dog-fisher, 

 for so the Latins call him, can smell a fish in the water a hundred 

 yards from him : Gesner says much farther : and that his stones 

 are good against the falling sickness ; and that there is an herb, 

 Benione, which, being hung in a linen cloth near a fish-pond, or 

 any haunt that he uses, makes him to avoid the place ; which 

 proves he smells both by water and land. And, I can tell you, 

 there is brave hunting this water-dog in Cornwall ; * where there 

 have been so many, that our learned Camden says there is a river 

 called Ottersey, which was so named by reason of the abundance 

 of Otters that bred and fed in it. 



And thus much for my knowledge of the Otter ; which you 

 may now see above water at vent, and the dogs close with him ; 

 I now see he will not last long. Follow, therefore, my masters^ 

 follow ; for Sweetlips was like to have him at this last vent. 



Venator. Oh me ! all the horse are got over the river, 

 what shall we do now ? shall we follow them over the water .' 



Huntsman. No, Sir, no ; be not so eager ; stay a little, 

 and follow me ; for both they and the dogs will be suddenly on 

 this side again, I warrant you, and the Otter too, it may be. 

 Now h^ve at him with Kilbuck, for he vents again. 



* In Devotishire. The River Ottersey is thus noticed in Cough's edition of CamtfeJi's 

 Britajifiia: " More eastward the Otterey (q.d., the Otter's river) falls into the sea, 

 passing by Honiton." — ^Vol. i. p. 29. Though pointed cut by Mr Moses Browne, the 

 error is not noticed by subsequent editors. 



